Three mornings each week, 15 Dartmouth students trek in camouflage fatigues to Leverone Field House for physical training, knowing that this effort, as a part of the Reserve Officers' Training Corps, can be the first step to a military career. For three of these students, the Pentagon's Jan. 23 announcement that women will be allowed to serve in combat roles opens up a wealth of new opportunities.
The lifted ban will offer new paths to female cadets as they progress in their careers, but it will not affect the ROTC program itself, according to Maj. Matt Aldrich, who oversees Dartmouth's ROTC program.
"We run our organization the same way the Army's trying to run their organization if you can do the job, then you can be in Dartmouth ROTC," he said.
About half of Dartmouth's ROTC members have signed a contract with the Army committing them to four years of active duty and four years in the Army Reserve after graduation, Aldrich said. While students interested in a military career can participate in the program without making a legal commitment, most choose to seek a contract, which allows them to apply for a potential full tuition scholarship, he said.
Graduating cadets who choose to sign the service contract indicate which Army branch they would prefer to join. Before Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's announcement, several military branches were effectively off-limits to women, including infantry, artillery, armor, combat engineers and special-operations units of battalion size. While the Pentagon will allow branches until January 2016 to evaluate if any positions will remain closed to women, the order has given women in the ROTC more flexibility in choosing a branch on their contract, ROTC participant Monica Wagdalt '15 said.
"It's probably something that's been a long time coming," Wagdalt said. "I don't know if it's necessarily a branch that I'm going to choose, but I think it's great because they're capable."
Since cadets are not guaranteed a placement in their chosen branch, however, female service members may now receive a combat role assignment unintentionally, according to ROTC participant Kate Hopkins '16. She said she is now reconsidering her preference order since she could now be placed in infantry if she does not end up in her first choice branch.
Hopkins said she is uncertain how she feels about the policy change allowing women to engage in active combat, but will defer to the positive reactions of women with military experience.
"I feel like you can't really deny that there are differences between men and women physically and mentally," Hopkins said. "It seems to me like it's an experiment. We don't know exactly how its going to go."
All three female ROTC participants said that they were most interested in entering military intelligence, which was already open to women before the policy change.
The shift from a linear battlefield to counterinsurgency warfare, in which units are vulnerable to attacks on all sides, means that women who technically serve in a support capacity have already been acting in combat roles, Aldrich said.
Sgt. Maj. Lonnie Clary, who helps to oversee Dartmouth's ROTC program, said that although physical differences between the sexes could impact their performance in the field, he supports the policy change. Clary expressed concern that many women may not have the strength to carry heavy packs, for example, or deal with unusual emergency situations that require more upper body strength. Other physical capabilities, however, such as women's superior hand-eye coordination, can give them an advantage in the field.
"When you look at this overall, the only thing that's going to stick out is the physical aspect," Clary said.
The new announcement means that any service member in the Army with the physical capabilities for a job will be able to serve in that role regardless of gender, Aldrich said. In the ROTC, physical fitness standards are currently the only difference between male and female cadets, Aldrich said.
These requirements such as the ability to do a certain number of pushups are based on differences in muscle mass and body composition, according to Dartmouth ROTC military science instructor Sgt. Derek Gay. Female cadets are graded just as harshly as male cadets in fitness examinations and everyone takes the same written tests for tactics, he said.
Mac Murphy '15 said that she joined ROTC during her freshman Fall due to her interest in law enforcement, but she decided to leave the program because she was not comfortable making the 12-year commitment. She said that the difference in ROTC physical standards bothered her.
"It kind of makes you feel bad when the maximum you can do is the minimum someone else needs to pass," she said.
Students in the Dartmouth ROTC program complete soldiering and leadership courses, in addition to physical and tactical training, Aldrich said. Overall, the ROTC commissions about 5,000 second lieutenants each year.
At least two female members of the Class of 2017 have already signed up to joined in the Dartmouth program, according to Gay.
